Some of those statements sounded contradictory so that's why I replied with "does not compute". They also sounded very un-Fi.

possibly in part because i'm a Ne-dom. Fi is my "supportive parent" function - guiding and protecting, but not leading.

as others before me have often pointed out, Fi is often not visible until you overstep its boundaries. this, for me, is very true. i believe that everyone should be free to act as they please and as best suits them - myself included - as long as they're not hurting anyone else. so it's not hard to move from there into seeing myself in myriad roles: a sister, a daughter, a friend, a therapist, a counselor, a traveler, a driver, a planner, a swimmer, a musician, an artist, a student, a singer, a lover, a fighter, a debater, a mediator. i firmly believe that someone can be a benevolent debater or a malevolent mediator, depending on how they conduct themselves. the roles are not inherently opposed; it is not the role, but how one interprets it, that matters.

the Fi consistency for me lies in that, across all the roles, i have certain deep values i must adhere to. i should not hurt others (unless it is a temporary minor hurt for the sake of getting to a major truth that will be healing). i should help everyone be in a position of contentment and love. i should be kind. i should be generous. i should be encouraging. these statements may manifest outwardly in a way that sounds very Fe to you because they are very similar to Fe.

plus - me personally: 1) i'm Fi auxiliary, not dom, 2) everyone in my nuclear family has Fe before Fi, 3) my mom, my primary nurturer/caretaker, is a Fe dom, and 4) my 4 closest friends include an ENFJ and two ESFJs. what i mean to show by all of this is that it's no surprise to me if i come off as a Fe user sometimes. i modeled behavior as a young child primarily off a Fe dom and i am surrounded by Fe doms, both by chance and choice. i really don't see that much conflict between the two, and it's completely unsurprising to me that they overlap in some places. they are both manifestations of Feeling: they care for people, both oneself and others. Fi focuses on the self and Fe focuses on others, but they both ultimately achieve the same goal of taking care of all people.

Originally Posted by Arclight

I don't see how what you are saying is any different.. Whatever the motivation is, it's irrelevant .. You adapt to each situation. Whether it be in the name of etiquette or personal values., it still amounts to the same thing, your behavior changes.

This does not mean the core does not remain intact.

exactly.

It would also be nice if maybe, you refrained from telling people what their functions should look like?

this too.

Originally Posted by Arclight

You are saying the exact same thing she is.. and getting fussed over semantics.. and telling her she doesn't sound very Fi

That's why I am butting in

yeah, and i appreciate it, arclight. both because i appreciate someone pointing out that my experience of the function is valid and because i know that you're seeing what i'm seeing, too, and i'm not just totally off here.

Originally Posted by Moiety

No, I don't. Because as any Fi user will tell you preserving our identity irrespective of the crowd is very important sometimes. My intent and motivations have prevented me from adapting to the crowd numerous crowds.

i find it funny to hear this from someone whose profile says NeJi - and i assume that given me being definite-110%-sure-NeFi (and i am only 110% certain about a few very important things in life), you can understand why i honestly don't find your insinuation that i am not a Fi user to be incredibly compelling. ever since i learned the functions, i have always known i was a Fi type, and before intensive study i believed myself to be a Fi-dom. i do not possess Fe in my top 4 functions and i don't appreciate the implication that, because my Fi values sound "too Fe-y" for you, i have typed myself incorrectly. you have no idea how long or how intensely i've studied this system or how sound my typing of myself is. if you'd like to come to me with actual arguments for what type i am and why, you're welcome to, but "any Fi user will tell you ____" is really rather insulting to my own Fi given that it is part of my identity.

(if that's not enough - does the blatant irritability and self-righteousness here help clue you in that i probably am Fi aux? )

and - my intent and motivations have done the same. i often don't go along with the crowd, because i either believe i should be doing something else or i purely don't feel like doing what everyone else is doing. sometimes i go against the grain simply because i feel like expressing myself in a certain way, even though others are not into it at the time.

that said, i do not find it at all out of character to adapt to a situation. in fact, it's very useful. i have a better time in class if i quiet down and apply myself. am i breaking any of my values? no... there's no value of mine that says i must be flighty and excitable all the time. why can't i be intense and focused too? in fact, if that helps me achieve an objective i believe in (eg, buckling down to study physics even though i rather dislike it because the course is a med school prereq and i want to be a doctor because i have a deep-seated value that we should help heal others) - that behavior is completely in line with my values. but being serious while chatting with my friends after class isn't really going to help me on my way to being a doctor - plus being a little more bouncy and bubbly will put both myself and probably others too in a good mood - as well as give my mind a breather from intense learning - so that's quite consistent with my values of acting in a way that is pleasing to myself as well as that helps others.

genuine and consistent are not always the same. take, for example, moods - if i was grumpy and exhausted, and tried to be happy and bubbly like i usually am just for the sake of consistency (aka fake genuineness), i would be miserable inside. Fi is not about external consistency, after all. you might think i'm changing all the time from an outsider's point of view, but like arclight said, my core remains the same. my beliefs, at what one of my yoga teachers liked to call "heart-center", remain the same. it doesn't matter whether i'm screaming along at a concert or painting my nails on a lazy afternoon or paying my credit card bills. i'm still the one and only me, and there will never be another person like me. genuine isn't something you work towards. it's something you simply are. and understanding that is Fi to the core.

and... incidentally... it's Fe to the core, too. Fe and Fi are yin and yang. they're ultimately parts of a deeper whole, and at certain extremes they are one another. i take care of my self and as a result i have an understanding that helps me take care of everyone else. my Fe dom mom takes care of everyone else and as a result creates a good environment for her self. we end up at the same place.

Originally Posted by Arclight

And any Fe user will tell you identity is just as important to us. And it is in the name of that identity that we adapt..

So if Fi is to not care what other people think, that is OK.. If that's your personal value. But what if Your very personal and subjective value is to make sure that you be the appropriate you in every situation? Is that not using Fi to guide you?

It looks a lot Like Fe now doesn't it??.. and me being this adamant that you get this right sure looks a lot like Fi doesn't it??.. because you are treading on my values here.
And will continue to do so until you realize you are in fact, the one who made an ad hominem attack on someone, and it just happened to be someone I really like .. So meet Fe with Sp/Sx dom.. And tell your FI to chew on it

And Don't you see the irony???.. this a thread about being yourself.. and you are telling someone it's bad to be themselves because it trips your own Fi.. Dear God!

Oh, I'm terribly sorry, I was seeing her as a person not a "type" belonging to a theory with dubious merit. Next time I have anything to say to her I'll just say it to you since you two share some bond that allows you to answer for her.

Shit, I'll just let you write my posts from now on since you have such a clear view into my head.

What's it like to be so fucking brilliant? And for everyone else to draw the false assumptions?

I can see you're offended.

It sounded like you didn't even read her post.

Originally Posted by disregard

If anything, that person should mind their damn business or offer you a solution (a la "you're so cool when you're with me, you don't need to act like them").

You say that eventhough she said:

Originally Posted by Rachelinpa

my analysis is that i know i have my two-sided personality. the deeper, introspective me and the mad-hype puppy love bouncy me... they are both ME! i tried to explain this, but istp kept arguing that i should "be myself" and relax around his friends. i am being myself!

I saw nothing in her post that suggested she was faking anything. The need for a "solution" is misplaced given what she wrote in her post. Now, we may get more insights if she comes back and gives some more information. Maybe she is insecure, I don't know. But evidence of insecurity (ie. altering her behavior as part of a defence mechanism) is lacking at this point.

my analysis is that i know i have my two-sided personality. the deeper, introspective me and the mad-hype puppy love bouncy me... they are both ME! i tried to explain this, but istp kept arguing that i should "be myself" and relax around his friends. i am being myself! i'm just guarding what is important to me (the inner part), just as i would assume other people would do. it seems this is not that unusual, and i don't think that i'm putting up a front. i'm just not laying it all out there. istp seems to think that everyone would love me if they knew the "real me," (i.e. less bubbly extroverted)

This sounds like a nervous reaction to me.

I could be wrong, but I know from my own behaviour that being in relatively 'new' social situations can go one of two ways; either I'll be extremely quiet (what happens more often than not) or in an effort to be 'okay' with everyone I get over bubbly and gregarious.

That's not to say that neither are natural states for me depending on the mood, but i know that until I feel completely comfortable around people (harking back to the "i'm just guarding what is important to me (the inner part)") this can happen out of nerves.

Originally Posted by Moiety

Just be yourself. Don't care what other people think, not even your SO. But don't extrovert from a place of wanting attention. It has to be a cool kind of extroverting...you say what your self thinks needs to be said when it needs to be said. Completely at peace with who you are, and realizing nothing you say should make you feel ashamed of yourself.

I think this corresponds with the assessment of nerves. However becoming completely at peace with who you are can take come time and a lot of self awareness and introspection. Although it's so, SO worth it... =)

I know I'm not an ENFP, but this is something that i can relate in part to. As I have a rather multi faceted and sometimes contradictory personality. Within this it means that I have several groups and types of friends and how i am with each of them is slightly different, yet at the core i am still essentially ME. i.e. The way I am with my Uni friends is not exactly the way I am with my work colleagues which is not exactly the same way I am with my closest friends - and even then they are a very mixed group of people.

So, if being outgoing and bubbly in groups is your natural state I guess you could explain it as it being how you relate to people in that setting but that in a one on one your quieter side comes out?

Terrible things happen to good people every day.
Consequentially, I am not one of the good people.I am one of the terrible things..

Skylights : I can see I misjudged you, in thinking you got where I was going. Apparently you think I was suggesting you were not a Fi user and you went on to imply a number of others things from what I said, which are not right.

I'm quite sick of the jumpiness of people around here and the unwarranted defensiveness when discussing most topics. So you'll excuse me if I don't properly address your huge post.

Two things though : What you said about Fi being simply some values one adheres too at all times, is not exclusive to Fi or to F. I never argued one shouldn't adapt to a situation and I did point out how the restaurant example is different.

Skylights : I can see I misjudged you, I am sorry, It was wrong of me to tell you how to be yourself in a thread about being yourself. You were right to call me arrogant and you should have thrown presumptions in there as well.

i didn't say those things were exclusive to Fi, nor that Fi is "simply some values one adheres to at all times." i think Fi is far more complex than that - it's a part, sure, but not the whole. what i was trying to explain was how it can allow for going with social currents, like Fe, without actually being Fe.

given arclight's reaction to your posts, i would say that i am not the only one who sensed that you were implying that my experience of my own functions is inferior. i got annoyed because of the reasoning implicit: your account of Fi "does not compute", thus the options are: 1) you are attributing this to the wrong function or 2) you have typed yourself wrong. there was no suggestion of, hey maybe i'm the one not understanding and i should ask the other poster what she means. that's why i was defensive - i didn't see it as unwarranted. i saw your statements as an attack on the validity of what i was saying, and on myself. i'm sorry that it came off as uncalled for to you, because it wasn't my intention to see hostility where there was none.

you can address my post or not as you please. it stands on its own as an account of how an ENFP could change with her environment and yet remain genuine, and as an affirmation to the OP that she hasn't done anything wrong if she's acted the way she feels is right, regardless of what others may say.

incidentally - i do indeed see your Ji. i myself am certain you have a good scoop of Ti in there somewhere, regardless of what other functions you may use as well. nothing can get me riled up quite like Ti.